-LRB- CNN -RRB- -- On Monday , news broke that about 200 girls had been kidnapped from their school in Chibok , in the northeastern state of Borno -- a region at the center of Nigeria 's five-year terrorist insurgency .

The very next day , the Nigerian military announced that all but nine of the girls had been rescued .

This turned out to be untrue . The school 's principal and the girls ' parents complained that the girls were still missing .

In August last year , a military spokesman announced the death of Abubakar Shekau , the leader of Islamist extremist group Boko Haram , at the hands of the military . But like the news of the release of the schoolgirls , it proved to be fiction .

` Misleading sources '

Incidents like this have come to shape the way the military is perceived in the wildly unpredictable battle against Boko Haram . Posts on the military 's social media accounts regularly boast of `` smoking out '' or ambushing terrorists or recovering weapons -- often written in way that brings to mind Iraq 's infamous former information minister under Saddam Hussein , dubbed `` Comical Ali , '' who claimed coalition forces were in retreat even as American tanks rolled almost unchallenged across the country in 2003 .

Like him they 've also ended up pinning the blame for inaccurate reporting on `` misleading '' sources .

Even when there is truth to its narratives -- and there have been major successes , including a crackdown that started in early 2013 that killed several top Boko Harem commanders and driven others across the border into Chad , Niger and Cameroon -- the triumphalism seems odd when juxtaposed with the harsh reality of events like the Chibok abduction , or the one at another government school in neighboring Yobe State in February , in which more than fifty schoolboys were murdered in their dormitories , with nary a soldier in sight until several hours later .

Perhaps the military resorts to this impulsively buoyant tone because it believes it can not afford to sound anything otherwise . Or perhaps it 's simply because it can get away with it -- because the Nigerian authorities have a long and remarkable history of getting away with anything they say .

That tenuous relationship with fact makes it relatively easy for senior government officials to publicly dispute government finances to the tune of billions of dollars ; and for an assortment of newspaper headlines to display wildly differing casualty figures the morning after a bombing incident .

Death ` cheap and plentiful '

And then there 's the scale of Nigeria 's tragedies . For a country that is not at war , death is cheap and plentiful . So cheap and so sweeping in its audacity that Nigerians readily make jokes about it . That might help explain the trademark blunted edge of Nigerian outrage . If it happens often enough , the mind is soon inured , and eagerly accepting of the sense of resignation that might offer the best protection against the emotional impact of the next cycle of negative breaking news .

All of the above combine to create the context in which the Nigerian military -- wielding political power for 29 of Nigeria 's first 39 years after independence -- has learned to operate .

Not since the civil war , almost 50 years ago , has it been tested this much . The closest it got were the lengthy tours of duty in Liberia and Sierra Leone , in which it played a prominent role at the head of the West African ECOMOG Force , intended more as a `` peacekeeping '' unit than a combat force .

Indeed what we are seeing may be evidence of its struggle to adapt to new rules of engagement , fighting an enemy driven by convictions much deeper than those displayed by the pro-democracy activists and diamond-obsessed rebels it contended with in the 1990s ; possessing access to sophisticated weapons , and operating in terrain far better suited to insurgents than conventional armies .

Abuse claims

The increasing militarization of the troubled zones has since spurred accusations of human rights abuses , from local and international observers . An International Crisis Group report from April 2014 has called for an end to the use of `` heavy-handed military and police methods that risk pushing yet more restless , jobless and frustrated youths into violence and extremism . ''

Communication strategies also require overhaul . In the age of social media , the military needs to realize that propaganda is now a lot more likely to be found out and discredited .

News reports suggest that the military , long hampered by aging hardware , is now acquiring new weapons and equipment . That 's heartwarming . In a country where institutional graft is the rule and not the exception , it is crucial to ensure that the military budgets are spent to boost the military 's capability , and troops ' morale -- and not pocketed by bigwigs .

International cooperation also needs to be stepped up ; and it does seem that the government is now more willing than ever to work with Europe and America . Nigerians have long been wary of allowing the American military the sort of foothold it has in countries like Yemen and Pakistan , but there 's certainly room for more intense cooperation that does not involve abdicating total control .

Finally the military will need to prepare to adapt itself to the reality of the government 's planned shift to a `` soft '' counter-terrorism strategy , embodied in a document unveiled by National Security Adviser , Sambo Dasuki , a retired Army Colonel , in March .

Amid the backlash it has faced recently , the beleaguered military can count on the support of a growing number of Nigerians , who think that it is being under appreciated for the work it is doing . Just this week a `` Support The Nigerian Military '' page launched on Facebook , in honor of `` our military men and women on the field who risk their lives daily to keep us safe . ''

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Ogunlesi : Nigeria 's military has issued incorrect statements in fight against extremists

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Often blame their inaccurate reporting on `` misleading sources , '' he says

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Ogunlesi says the military may be trying to paint a constantly positive picture

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Ogunlesi says it has had some successes in its five-year war with Islamist extremists